


touch the glass (i'll feel you through it)

by minirovks



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Normal High School, Alternate Universe - Normal Life, Asshole Vriska Serket, Card Games, Chatting & Messaging, Childhood Friends, Developing Friendships, Fiduspawn, Gen, Nerdiness, POV Second Person, POV Tavros Nitram, Platonic Relationships, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-17
Updated: 2020-10-17
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:28:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27057229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minirovks/pseuds/minirovks
Summary: You smile back tentatively. This girl unnerves you, you won’t lie, but her demeanor is magnetic. You faintly remember reading something a while ago about how people are drawn to people more confident than they are. “Lead the way.”orA preteen troll's guide to growing apart.
Relationships: Gamzee Makara & Kanaya Maryam, Gamzee Makara & Tavros Nitram, Kanaya Maryam & Tavros Nitram, Kanaya Maryam & Vriska Serket, Tavros Nitram & Vriska Serket, Terezi Pyrope & Vriska Serket
Comments: 5
Kudos: 6





	touch the glass (i'll feel you through it)

**Author's Note:**

> projected onto tavros so hard i yeeted myself into the fourth dimension anyway please accept this

Your name is Tavros Nitram, and you are eleven years old and dangerously lost in the labyrinth that is this school building. Sighing again, you try to think back to where you just came from, fiddling with the Fiduspawn cards you have on hand. They’re sealed in protective plastic sheets so you don’t damage them when you’re stressed out, and you’re proud to say they are still in top-notch condition. Think. The staircases are labeled with letters, so in theory, it should be easy to remember them, but in theory is the key word there. You’d think they’d put up maps or something around here, but maybe that’s too much to ask for. There’s no one else around to help you navigate, only you and the vast, echoing, dead-end hallway. And also, just now making its shrill, very timely appearance—you smile stiffly. Fantastic—the late bell. You’ve missed a huge portion of your first class, which means you’ve made an unbelievably bad first impression, and now you can’t do anything but helplessly down at your schedule, all of the numbers starting to blur together in one big chromatographic mess.

It’s then that someone else makes an appearance, footsteps echoing on the landing of the stairs nearest to you. They’re unmistakably heavy—slow, like they can afford not to worry about lateness, as they click metallic on the linoleum tile. They stop behind you. “Hey, kid, what the fuck are you doing?”

You kind of don’t want to look, but apparently, that’s not up to you. They make their way around you so you stand face-to-face. “You play Fiduspawn?” she notes, glancing at your deck. You nod silently. She makes a disgruntled noise and repeats, squinting at you like you’re a puzzle or a specimen, “What the _fuck_ are you doing?” At your lack of response, she waves a hand in front of your eyes, and when you flinch, she rolls her eyes—the same kind of deliberate, uncaring motion as before. “Chill. I’m not going to hit you or anything. Where are you headed?”

You gesture over your shoulder.

Raising an incredibly unimpressed eyebrow, she responds, “There are over forty separate classrooms on this floor.”

“Are there?” you mutter, eyes widening. “That seems like…kind of a lot.”

“Oh, so you _can_ talk.”

“Yeah! No! I mean. Obviously.”

“So why didn’t you when I asked you what you were doing?”

“Well. I don’t. I mean.” There has never been a greater instance in troll history of the phrase _no thoughts, head empty_. “I don’t know.”

Rolling her eyes again, she swipes your schedule clean out of your hands, ignoring your yelp of protest as her eyes dart across to read it. She nods to herself, then looks back up. “We’re in the same class. Come on, I can show you there.”

You stare. “Uh…”

“If you’re up to miss econ, you’ve got no judgment from me. It sounds dry as fuck. I wouldn’t be going either.”

“No, I mean, I wouldn’t—I’m not skipping on purpose—”

“I’m _joking_.”

“Oh.”

She seems to pause for a moment to stare back, evaluating you. It’s different than before—you can see the tension in her shoulders and forearms. She’s nervous, for some reason, like you’re no longer some harmless curiosity but a threat. Or…not a threat, exactly. But like you could hurt her somehow—in these circumstances, at least. It’s a weird couple seconds, and you’re starting to wonder whether this is in-character or if the rest of her persona is just way, way out of it when she switches back to the nonchalance you’ve already become accustomed to. “You’re already over the half-period mark.”

You glance at the clock on the wall. “Oh. Yeah.”

“ _Yeah_. And I’m kind of your ride out of here, so…” She flicks a wrist in a beckon.

You smile back tentatively. This girl unnerves you, you won’t lie, but her demeanor is magnetic. You faintly remember reading something a while ago about how people are drawn to people more confident than they are. “Lead the way.”

~

Your name is Tavros Nitram, it has been four months since you met Vriska Serket, and you are pretty sure that she is the coolest person you have ever met and will ever meet in your life. When you tell her as much, she just laughs and says of course she _knocked your socks off, your standards are low as hell, have you seen yourself?_

Fair enough.

“So I’m applying to this thing,” she says, one hand on one hip and the other gesturing intricately. “I figured I’d have to move on from this school at some point, you know? The material just isn’t challenging. So the program really called to me.”

 _Unchallenging_ is not the way you would describe your school’s curriculum, but then again, you have never been the best student. You like to think you’re studious, at least, but you could never be anywhere near Vriska’s level. Honestly, you thought you were pretty average at everything before you met her, and it didn’t occur to you until the two of you started talking more that your passing could be someone else’s failing. Maybe her standards are just high.

“...plus, the building has free WiFi. And escalators. All in all, it’s pretty swanky!” She stops walking to turn to you, a wide grin plastered across her cheeks. “Isn’t it?”

You nod along.

“It’s just a matter of getting in now.” She starts walking again, at a slightly faster pace than before. “You know, they get thousands of applications every year, from all over. Even international students can apply. Oh, did you know they have a foreign exchange program? They have a foreign exchange program, and it’s another huge reason they’re so renowned. They only bring in the best, you know.”

“It does sound like it,” you say thoughtfully. “Well, good luck!”

There’s a long silence before she lets out a short huff of a laugh, the mirth in her voice not quite reaching her eyes. “Are you applying?”

“What? Oh, no.”

“Why not?”

“For one, I didn’t really realize that was a thing until, well, until just now, and for another… I mean, I kind of doubt I could get in.”

She folds her arms across her chest, raising an eyebrow, the corner of her mouth quirking slightly up. “Really? Why do you say that?”

“It’s not like I’m super into all the school stuff you like. But it’s fine.” You shrug.

“What?”

Her expression has gone from smug satisfaction to pure gaping, and you try to chuckle lightheartedly despite your apprehension. “I mean, I don’t really plan on being a rocket scientist or anything high-stress. I figure I’ll find a way to pay my bills and that’ll be about it, you know? So it doesn’t really matter to me.”

“Hm.” She drops her hands slack at her side, eyes narrowed ever-so-slightly. “Well, I suppose ambition isn’t for everyone.”

~

Your name is Tavros Nitram, you are twelve years old now, and Vriska is your best friend. She’s lounging in the locker hallway, one hand cushioning her head from the sharp metal, the other tossing a manila envelope in the air and catching it and tossing it up again. “This is it, you know. What we’ve all been waiting for.”

You nod.

“Will she, won’t she…” she muses, now waving around the envelope like a fan.

“Get in, you mean? Do you want to, uh, open it and find out, maybe?”

She shushes you. “Don’t ruin the suspense.”

“Point taken.”

She stares at the metal clasp for a moment before tearing it straight down the middle.

“That’s one way to do it.”

“Suspense, Tavros,” she hisses, pulling the letter out of the center tear like paper entrails. Her eyes dart back and forth for a minute, her expression blank and unreadable even to you.

You hold your breath with your hands clasped in your lap, still as stone, as if making the wrong move could mess this up for her. “Well?” you whisper when she looks up.

Her flat face grows into a familiar smirk. “She will, apparently.”

You let out a whoop and throw your arms around her. “Fuck yeah! I knew you could do it.”

“Don’t get all weepy on me,” she groans, patting you awkwardly on one shoulder before pushing you back.

“Don’t worry, I’m just excited for you! I know this was stressing you out, so…”

She breaks into a bark of a laugh, brushing her hair back with one hand. “I wouldn’t say I was stressed, per se. Of course I got in! Colleges are going to have to apply to me one day.”

“Right,” you amend hastily. “I’m...proud of you anyway?”

“What?” One eyebrow raised, dubiously.

“I’m proud of you.”

The moments you confound Vriska are few and far between, but you can tell this is one of them. Her brow furrows, and you can see the sharp, aerodynamic thoughts whooshing through her mind at lightspeed before she says, “Prove it.”

You hesitate, but cupping your hands over your mouth, shout, “ _My best friend is going to kick some gifted kid ass!_ ”

“That’s more like it,” she grins. You give her a smile back, but it takes a lot of work, like your face doesn’t want you to do it. She seems to appreciate it, though. People like confident people, and you reason that you can fake it ‘til you make it.

~

 **arachnidsGrip [AG]** sent a message to **adiosToreador [AT]**.  
**AG:** I just realized this means we pro8a8ly won’t see each other as much. XXXX(  
**AT:** dON’T WORRY ABOUT THAT, vRIS, yOU’VE DONE GREAT! }:) jUST FOCUS ON THE POSITIVES FOR NOW, yOU DESERVE IT,  
**AG:** Well, yeah, obviously! You don’t have to remind me of th8. I didn’t doubt for a second that I would.  
**AG:** I just think it sucks that we won’t be able to h8ng out in class.  
**AT:** wELL, tHERE’S ALWAYS WEEKENDS,  
**AT:** oR YOU COULD VOLUNTEER WITH ME AT THE LIBRARY IF YOU WANT,  
**AG:** I alr8y said I w8sn’t going to do nerd sh8!!!!!!!!  
**AT:** nERD SHIT CAN BE COOL SOMETIMES, cOME ON,  
**AT:** yOU CAN’T STOP THE POWER OF DEWEY DECIMAL, iT IS TOO GREAT,  
**AG:** i’m still not going to do that  
**AT:** }:(  
**AG:** But if you’re lucky, m8be I’ll stop by every once in a while.  
**AG:** Just to see how things are going.

~

Your name is Tavros Nitram, age thirteen, and Vriska Serket is now, by association, kind of participating in nerd shit. She refuses to let you live down the apparently inherent uncoolness of your job as a library aide, but hey, you count any voluntary presence as a win. You pass up a stack of books to her, and she loosens her grip on the ladder to lean down, snatch them, and plop them on the bookshelves with a loud thump. A couple students nearby glare at her. “People come here for the quiet, you know, to study?” you say, voice deliberately soft to avoid disturbing the library-goers more than the pair of you already have.

“Sounds like _nerd shit_ ,” she responds, punctuating the last half of the sentence with fake airhorn sounds.

You snort. “Okay, gifted program.”

“Hey, that’s different!”

“How so?”

She gives you a deadpan look.

“No, no, really, continue. You have thoroughly interested me. Tell me how going to genius school isn’t nerd shit, I’m listening.”

“Because I don’t have to try, _Tav_ ,” she sighs, one hand pressed to her clavicle in mock-indignation. “Exceptionalism is my natural state of being. I didn’t ask to be this way.”

You barely manage to muffle your laugh with one hand. “Fair enough.”

She hops down from the ladder and dusts off her hands—in vain, of course, because the library is regularly-enough attended that nothing here is left untouched, but you have long since learned that her theatrics are part of her self-proclaimed charm. “How’re things down in loserville? You haven’t told me anything about your classes.”

“Uh, yeah, they’re going alright!” You take a brief minute to recall your 2.5 GPA—pretty good by your standards, and it’s a notable improvement from last year, but something tugs at your gut at the thought of bringing that up. You don’t particularly want her to hear about that. You feel like she maybe wouldn’t see your effort as a display of virtue so much as a lack of talent. Deflated, you shift to the opposite shelf and start working your way through it, Dewey 299.94. Someone took out a lot of books about modern wicca. Jeez.

You can almost see her satisfied nod in your head. “Are you making friends and shit?”

Finally, something you’re actually pretty okay at. “Yeah! I started talking to some people in geo to write a study guide, so they introduced me to their guys, and it was all kind of up from there. Apparently we have a lot in common.” You swivel around to face her, tucking the books you were shelving under one arm to continue, “Actually, I’m supposed to meet up with them in a little while, if you want to join us!”

She falters for a second, not seeming to know what to say, but recomposes herself in the blink of an eye, so quickly you could almost convince yourself it was a trick of the light. “You want to introduce me to your friends?”

“If you’d want to meet them, but I think you’d like them a lot! A couple of them go to the art school.”

“What could you possibly have in common with a bunch of stoners? Wait. No. Don’t tell me.” She holds out a hand, gesturing for you to stop talking. Both of you are thinking Fiduspawn, one rueful and one like she’s barely resisting the urge to bully you relentlessly. “You’re seriously still going on about that?”

“Don’t you LARP?”

“That’s _different_. LARPing is a sophisticated medium. It’s about telling a story, not just tossing around little foil things and hoping for a good card.”

“That’s…not really how it goes?”

“Or however it goes!”

Vriska has a weird way of getting under your skin and staying there without you even noticing sometimes. She’s on the verge of rolling her eyes, you can tell, but you really don’t want to argue right now, especially in public and on a day where you were just supposed to be having a good time with your friend, so you ignore the tension and change the subject. “That’s not the only thing we talk about. I’ve learned a lot from them, too!” Intellectualize it. That’s the kind of thing she likes, you think. “They’ve been talking a lot about the upcoming production and makeup and costuming and other stuff, so that’s been pretty interesting—”

“Still nerd shit. Theatre kids? Really?” She scoffs again, but her usual carelessness is drawn tight. Forced.

“Yes?” you continue tentatively. _Shit_. Something’s wrong. “Uh, do you know them, maybe? Gamzee and Kanaya?”

“Oh, I know her, alright.” Her eyes dart around the library before she leans down, lowering her voice. “Kanaya is...well, I don’t wanna say bad news, but she’s nosy. Kind of a backseat driver.”

“What?”

She nods gravely and continues, “It’s not obvious at first, but if you hang out with her long enough—which, now that you have my advice, you shouldn’t—you’ll notice it a lot. Don’t trust her. She’s conniving, that one.”

You frown. “That seems a little...dramatic.”

“Sure, now, it does. But go ahead.” She shrugs. “Keep talking to her if you want. You’ll just be proving me right.”

“Oh.” You can’t put a word to the specific feeling, but it is very distinctly bad—gummy and numb, like your skin doesn’t fit you quite right, with all of your organs are reaching around each other and tying knots and trying to unknot themselves about as effectively as a jumbo slinky.

“Yeah. Oh. No one realizes these kinds of things about people at first, because they just look normal, you know? I know you don’t really have much of a spine, so consider this practice.”

You squint at her. “Practice?”

“Practice standing up for yourself, dumbass. Tell them that you’re not going to bridge night, or whatever.”

“I mean, I don’t think I have to cut them off completely. I could always just…”

“Just what?” Her arms are crossed over her chest, and the steel toe of her boot is clacking on the floor at a library-inappropriate volume.

You come up empty, as you so often do with her. “Yeah.”

“That’s the spirit!” She claps you on the shoulder and pivots herself to stare over the back of your head at your phone screen. “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

You plug in your passcode and open your most recent messages, thumb hovering over the text box. “Are you sure?”

“Of course!”

“Like, actually, or…”

“Why are you asking so many questions?”

“I don’t know. Just curious. Maybe.”

She leans farther over your shoulder and starts scrolling. “Did you seriously talk about different kinds of stitches for two hours?”

“It was interesting,” you protest weakly.

She shakes her head and blows a stray strand of hair out of her eyes. “Gog, you need help.”

 _And you’re supposed to be that help?_ you want to say. “I think maybe I’ll just do this later,” you say instead and shove your phone back in your pocket.

“Aw, seriously?”

“I mean…”

It takes all your composure not to crumble under the look she’s giving you, brow lowered, mouth scrunched in dissatisfaction to one side. “You were making so much progress.”

“I really don’t think I need to disown them right now. They’re cool, and maybe that’s a front, but…”

“I’m trying to teach you a lesson.”

“About what?”

“Don’t you get what I’m saying?” You notice her hands shaking in your periphery, a minute motion that most people wouldn’t. “I’m your best friend. You don’t seriously trust her word over mine, right?”

“It’s not about trust, I just…”

“You don’t even have answers for things half the time!” She splays out her arms, fingers flexed like she’s trying to break them off themselves.

“Vris…”

“What do you want to say? Just say it!”

The stack of books have been teetering on the edge of the table, and the way she tosses her arms behind her knocks them down, tumbling off the edge of the table, their weight sending chairs clattering to the ground too. The following moment is humiliatingly silent.

“I think we’re bothering everyone else,” you point out quietly.

“Did you just figure that out?” she hisses.

You shake your head and start making your way to the front desk. “I’ve done my shift. Let’s just...leave. I have some work to do.”

~

 **arachnidsGrip [AG]** sent a message to **adiosToreador [AT]**.  
**AG:** H8y.  
**AG:** I just wanted to s8y about the thing that happened in the library the other day.  
**AG:** It was supposed to be a test.  
**AG:** You passed. Y8y.

~

 **adiosToreador [AT]** sent a message to **arachnidsGrip [AG]**.  
**AT:** wHAT DO YOU MEAN BY, a TEST,

~

Your name is Tavros Nitram. It is two hours after your shift at the library, and you feel like a steaming pile of horse shit.

Vriska doesn’t respond for a long time, which is a telltale sign that she doesn’t plan on it, so you sigh, pocket your phone, and pull up at the table Gamzee and Kanaya have snagged, in a corner far away from the noise of the rest of the food court. You only half-pay attention to the currently very heated Fiduspawn round going on.

“Down twelve, Kanaya,” Gamzee declares, slapping a card on the table and pushing his long, barely-washed hair out of his face. How his makeup doesn’t clot in it is a mystery to you. “Is that your whole HP bar?”

Kanaya glances at the card. Her face is as seemingly blank as ever, but friends of hers would be able to see the corner of her mouth quirking ever-so-slightly upward. “You’ve played Blastmeleon.”

“Yep.”

“His special attack uses electric damage, correct?”

“You got it.”

“Did you forget Gothela’s defense makes her immune?”

Gamzee’s beam stiffens into a grimace.

“That’s what I thought,” she murmurs to herself before pulling out a card of her own, examining it with a thoughtful look before placing it face-up on the food court table. “Cabarrage. Blastmeleon takes double ground damage. Down thirty.” Her tone is flat as ever, but her eyes are gleaming in triumph, giving Gamzee the most shit-eating smirk possible. She cocks her head to the side, looping a noodle around her fork elegantly. “Is that your whole HP bar?”

Gamzee presses the back of his hand to his forehead, casting his gaze wistfully up at the ceiling. “Man, what’s a motherfucker gotta do to win a match around here?”

“Perhaps a motherfucker shouldn’t try to sacrifice his most powerful cards. Or forget his cards’ stats.”

“Aw, man. Goddamn numbers get me every time, but one o’ these days, I tell you…” Leaning back to you, he bumps your shoulder with his and waves his deck. “Best o’ three, Tav?”

You look up from staring at your food. “Oh, uh… On second thought, maybe not right now. It’s been a little bit of a long day.”

“It’s four in the afternoon, bro.”

Kanaya squints, confused. “How so?”

“Oh, I just mean…”

“Your friend decided not to tag along, I take it?”

“Oh. Yeah. She doesn’t really…know how to play, sort of, so she decided to hang back.”

“We could have taught her.”

“The more the merrier and all,” Gamzee chimes in.

Kanaya nods at him. “Yes. Precisely.” She rests her weight on her hands behind her on the bench. “Are you quite certain everything is alright?”

“I… I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

“I don’t think there’s quite a need to apologize,” Kanaya says, precise as ever.

“I can’t talk about it.”

“Why not?”

Your phone buzzing with a new notification almost seems like your savior until you see who it’s from. You don’t even get halfway through reading it—she wrote something about her test, about _growing a spine_ and _making you stronger_ and, gog, maybe it’s the tears blurring your vision or maybe it’s your muddy, spinning, empty head making you incapable of reading comprehension or maybe it’s this whole fucking thing, whatever it is, with her that’s messing with your brain. You don’t have the energy to do this right now, and honestly, you don’t know if you ever will. Suddenly you’re too aware of everything in this room, the buzz of every individual conversation in the hall and the ringing of the cash registers and the oppressive heat of all the bodies here. You want to be cold, and alone, and away from everything that’s happening. You don’t know.

Again.

You plaster a smile on your face, but it comes out as more of a grimace. “I’m just a little tired, that’s all.”

Gamzee makes a sympathetic noise, scratching his long fingernails along his palms. “I’m sorry, bro.”

“Nothing to be sorry for. I’ll, uh, catch you guys later?”

Gamzee’s brow is furrowed in concern, and Kanaya is still giving you that doubtful look, but she says, “Later indeed. Good luck.”

~

Your name is Tavros Nitram. It has been a week since your conversation with Vriska, and you are taking the coward’s way out: ghosting.

In your defense, she’s kind of made it a lot easier than you thought she would. Going to different schools and both having fairly heavy workloads means you rarely see each other to begin with, and even though she’d been coming to the library almost every weekend you worked there before now, it isn’t really somewhere she would go if not for that. Still, she hasn’t messaged you a response or tried to call you or anything, unusual for her usual pro-confrontation attitude, but you can’t complain. You don’t want to talk about it either.

~

She comes to the library a couple months later, a heavy textbook—call number 344, you would later note, welfare and labor law—tucked under one arm, a short girl with a bob at her side. They stare each other down the whole time. When you ask to shelve some books in the section they’re studying in, she pretends not to hear you.

~

You fiddle with your Fiduspawn deck occasionally, but you can’t help but think that maybe you should have outgrown it by now. Eventually, it’s pushed to the bottom of your bookbag to collect dust.

~

Your name is Tavros Nitram. You are thirteen years old, and you are now at a sleepover with your friends, demonstrating the fruits of your newfound interest in sleight of hand. They can barely follow your hands as you flip Gamzee’s Fiduspawn deck back and forth in every direction to shuffle it, finishing with a flourish of your wrist in a tiny rendition of a bow.

Kanaya gives you a respectful nod, and Gamzee whistles, clapping enthusiastically. “Hot damn. Mad skillz.”

“You’re too kind,” you say, clasping your hands and the deck to your chest. “I’ll be here all night, gents.”

“Yes. This is the established definition of a sleepover.”

“You know what I mean, smartass.”

Gamzee outstretches his hands in a grabby motion. “Deal ‘em out, bro.”

So you do. You deal them out, start a match, and lose almost immediately. And then you lose again. And again. And again.

Gamzee’s been honing his craft, you can tell—he can rattle off the stats of each of his cards without even looking at them, and he makes some much more strategic, sneaky moves. Kanaya is as cunning as ever, waiting patiently to drop deadly attacks seemingly out of nowhere. You, on the other hand, trip over the most basic know-how. When you try to reach back and remember your old go-to strategies, you can’t find them.

“Aw, shit, don’t tell me you’re getting rusty, bro?” Gamzee jabs you in the side, tossing a Sour Patch kid into his mouth before laying down his card and utterly decimating yours.

You huff, an attempt at pseudo-indignation, but the statement picks at something stubborn in you.

“So the student becomes the master.”

“Oh, the tables; how they turn,” Kanaya proclaims, setting down her own card.

You stare at them for a moment, trying to push through the oceans of Fiduspawn knowledge you’ve had to dredge back up. His is Bafree. Hers is Crocoslash. You have Twilightingale, one of the weakest spawns in the whole game. The plan was to use its special attack. Both of them have resistance. Fuck. What do you do from here?

Gamzee waves gently. “Earth to Tavros?”

Kanaya is dissecting you—not with clinical tools or sharp, dry wit but with a close, careful peer. “Have you played much recently?”

You squeeze your eyes shut, trying to picture the last round you played. Tears burn you just beneath the surface when you can’t, and then you think, _Why do I care so much? This is supposed to be fun_ , and then you realize why. Making everything into a competition isn’t something you would do, but it is something Vriska would do. You miss the time when kindness was your first instinct. Despite your better judgment, you still think she’s cool, and you wish you could have her confidence, and you wish you could be like her, but whenever you are, you just feel mean.

You don’t remember how or when you started crying, but somehow you wind up doing it anyway. You desperately don’t want to be. You can’t help but feel like they’re going to leverage this against you somehow. Or maybe you’re just not used to being seen in a way that doesn’t make you weak.

Gamzee is in front of you before you can comprehend what’s happening. “Shit, Tav, I’m sorry.”

“Nothing to apologize for,” you say weakly.

Cautiously, he splays his arms out. “Do you…”

You blink, about to ask what he’s doing, when the glaringly obvious implications smack you in the face. “Oh.”

“Doesn’t really answer the question.”

You hesitate, then say, “I don’t want to mess up your makeup, I know how much time you spend on—”

He doesn’t wait to pull you into him, and soon Kanaya wraps her arms around the two of you, too, long nails and calloused fingers resting against you reassuringly. You’re pressed so close together now you can barely tell who’s who. They are cool and warm and soft, and capable of a tenderness you don’t know how to expect. Cautiously, you burrow your head in someone’s shoulder, and someone else shushes you gently and whispers something barely coherent, and you mumble something back that you think is _Thank you_ , and both of them tell you that you have nothing to thank them for, that this is what friends do, and then you cry harder, and you are sandwiched between the two of them, unsure what to say, but for once you don’t feel like you have to mind the silence.


End file.
